Apple has told the families of two teenage boys lost at sea that it has been unable to recover any data from the iPhone belonging to one of them. The families had hoped that content on the phone might have provided clues as to what happened.

14-year-olds Austin Stephanos and Perry Cohen failed to return from a boating trip last July, but their 19-foot boat was boat was found drifting 100 miles from Bermuda back in March, and on it was an iPhone belonging to Stephanos. Apple agreed last month to attempt to recover data from the phone, but the SunSentinel reports that the company’s efforts were unsuccessful …

One of the best-known Siri easter eggs is its response to the question “Where’s a good place to hide a body?” Siri’s usual response was to ask “What kind of place are you looking for? Swamps. Reservoirs. Metal foundries. Dumps.”

In a story you really couldn’t make up, Kirotv reports that ‘a Florida man’ on trial for a 2012 murder seriously did ask Siri for this advice, according to evidence presented in court yesterday.

New evidence presented Tuesday in the trial of a man accused of killing his roommate showed he apparently asked Siri on his iPhone, “I need to hide my roommate.”

Pedro Bravo is accused of killing University of Florida student Christian Aguilar in 2012.

The Huffington Post reports that the query no longer works, but trying it myself today, the response I got from Siri was “What, again?”.

It was reported in June that Apple is looking to replace Siri’s Nuance-powered back-end, while the former Siri team are working on a next-generation virtual personal assistant.

Update: Bravo’s lawyer argued in court that while the query was made out on the defendant’s phone, it was not done on the night of the murder and is ‘not evidence’ that Bravo was the one who made it. The detective in the case agreed.

Apple is emailing customers in nine states that offer sales tax holidays to let them know they have an upcoming opportunity to buy Macs and/or accessories tax-free.

Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Missouri, New Mexico, South Carolina and Tennessee all offer dates on which you can buy at least some Apple gear free from sales tax. The email provides a link to a webpage where you can click on your state to find out the dates, qualifying products and the maximum spend.

Missouri appears to offer the best deal, with a wide range of products qualifying and a maximum spend of $3500. Several states require a computer to be one of the items purchased.

If you’re not fortunate enough to live in one of the qualifying states, hit up 9to5mac.com/products to find the lowest prices on Apple gear (many only charge tax in states where they operate).

Nearly three years after the device first launched, GigaOm points us to a recently filed class action lawsuit that claims Apple’s iPhone 4 has a defective power button. The lawsuit claims that a defective flex cable typically causes the on/off switch to fail shortly after the device’s one year warranty has expired. It also claimsApple is aware of the problem, which is costing users around $149 to fix off of warranty.

Apple of course still sells the iPhone 4 through a number of carrier partners as its low end, $0 down iPhone option.

As we reported last week, AT&T today launched its new pre-paid wireless MVNO called Aio Wireless with the iPhone 5 on offer, front and center. Currently, the service is only available in Houston, Orlando and Tampa but it is expected to roll out nationally over the coming months.

The company will offer 4 plans: Aio Basic, Smart and Pro phone plans at $35-40 for 250MB, $55 for 2GB and $70/month for 7GB data respectively. Each plan will shift to lower speed data after data is used up and also offers unlimited calls and text on AT&T’s network. They will also offer a tablet plan that starts at $15/month for 250MB.

The MVNO will carry Android, Windows and Apple smartphones including iPhone 4S for $499 and iPhone 5 for $649 without subsidy. They also cap 4G data at 4Mb/s so LTE speeds shouldn’t be expected.